dark wings, dark words
by Nagia
Summary: Joan Watson has a new sub-letter who hates blackbirds. Sarah Williams is desperately seeking a way to protect her baby brother — even if that means temporarily erasing him from his own life. And Will Graham doesn't want to go to New York City to investigate a string of cannibalistic murders.
1. can you count the blackbirds?

Thirteen birds shifted restlessly on a telephone wire outside a house in Upper Nyack, New York. They didn't look like healthy birds; their eyes seemed dull, tired, and their plumage lacked any sort of luster. Every so often, a bird would shift its weight on its perch and lose a few dark feathers.

A young woman in her twenties watched them and pulled her sweater closer around her shoulders.

One of the birds made eye contact.

The woman looked out at it, her fists clenching so hard in the soft wool that her knuckles went white.

Abruptly, Sarah Williams turned away from the window and headed in through the house. In a young boy's room, she pulled the shutters closed.

* * *

Rain pounded down on fallen leaves and forest grass. He could smell it, the rich scent of wet loam and water. A faint tang of sky clung to the water as it fell and he could smell that, too.

From behind him, he could the muffled clatter of hooves on damp earth. Fear rolled in rivulets down his spine, colder and wetter than the rain. Adrenaline made him jolt, his body feeling light, his stomach seeming to hover as it threatened to send its contents up through his throat.

He turned and saw precisely what he'd expected to see: a stag, walking slowly toward him. It had a pelt of glossy black feathers.

The scent of the rain changed, turned saltier, charged with iron.

The stag placed its hoof in a red-brown mud slick of blood., It watched him intently, as if wondering what he would do to turn the blood to water again.

And Will Graham woke in his shower. The water had long gone cold, and his skin was clammy. Winston and two of the other dogs had found their way past his shower curtain to press their noses to his knee.

He cut the water and reached down to pet the dogs.

* * *

The wiry man who stared intently into his apiary seemed less to possess nervous energy than to be made of it. Not for the first time, the woman who watched him wondered which truly had come first: his restless and racing mind, or his restless body?

Had one developed in deference to — defense of — the other, or were they perfectly comorbid?

It didn't matter.

What mattered was the way the bees buzzed around in their hive. She was no beekeeper, but even she could hear that the pitch of their noise had shifted. This was less the absent-minded drone she'd grown accustomed to hearing and more an angry sound.

Joan turned away from Sherlock and his hive, and looked out over the city. The sun had set, but that didn't mean the skyline had gone dark. Lights glistened, blinked, danced, near and far. The breeze played with the sky over the roof, brought her the scent of food and smog and a faint tang off the harbor.


	2. one for sorrow

A woman who couldn't have been older than twenty-two or twenty-three came streaming along the sidewalk, toward the brownstone. Joan tilted her head and watched through the window, noting the sensible dark coat, the toboggan, the scarves wrapped around the woman's neck. She wore what looked like black and green skate shoes — not designer — and walked with just a hint of a limp.

The woman stopped to look at a single blackbird sitting on a telephone wire outside the brownstone. She knelt and picked up a single feather, then reached inside her messenger bag and drew a wicked-looking knife of some dark metal. She cut the feather into pieces, which she dropped on the ground.

After a moment, the girl drew a tiny vial of something — probably hand sanitizer — from the purse and smeared it all over her hands. She gave the bird one last look over her shoulder as she walked toward the brownstone.

Joan opened the door shortly after the other woman knocked.

"Joan Watson?" The woman smiled up at her, as if she hadn't just been carving up bird feathers.

"That's me. You're Sarah Williams?"

The woman's smile turned warmer. "I am. May I come in?"

Joan stepped away from the door. "Of course."

The woman entered, unwinding the scarves and pulling off her hat. Hat and scarves went into her bag. She unbuttoned her coat, but left it on. She looked back to Joan. Her eyes were grass green, pale enough to fall into, and seemed to glint as if with some very private joke.

Joan could hear the limp as she led the woman to the living room. Now that they were inside, Sarah seemed to be moving slower, more carefully. Trying to hide her limp, or just taking time to observe the house?

"Would you like some tea?" She turned abruptly to see Sarah looking resentfully at her feet, as if they wouldn't quite obey her.

Sarah's gaze jerked up and she smiled. This one was less genuine than the smile she'd offered when they met; it was brighter, lips curling wider, but the movement of her cheeks didn't affect her eyes as much.

"That's really not necessary," Sarah said. "But thank you."

"What happened to your leg?"

"It's nothing important."

Joan raised an eyebrow. It was a calculated expression. The woman before her was young, injured, and trying to ingratiate herself to a stranger so she could sub-let an apartment.

Sarah held out a little longer than Joan would have expected, but she caved with a real smile and a shrug. "My parents are out in Upper Nyack. I was chasing my little brother around the back yard, stepped in a gopher hole or something, and — " She placed one fist on top of the other, then twisted them away from each other in different directions.

"And how long ago was this?"

Sarah pushed a mass of dark hair out of the way and rubbed the back of her neck. "Probably not long enough."

Yes, it was definitely a recent injury. "Have you had it looked at?"

"Nah. I've sprained this ankle enough times that I just slapped on an air cast, took some ibuprofen, and stayed off it for a few days."

Joan took in the ancient coat, the frayed bag, and Sarah's apparent age, decided that Sarah hadn't been in the work force long enough to have insurance, and chose not to press. She also decided not to mention that the limp was more consistent with an injury to the foot than the joint. Sarah had evidently decided that whatever was wrong with her was private, and Joan didn't really have a reason to go pressing.

Yet.

Once they'd seated themselves in the living room, Joan smiled. "So what was with the bird feathers?"

Sarah laughed. "You saw that, huh? It's a habit I picked up from my boyfriend. He says it prevents bad luck."

Joan checked her phone, but just as she thought, the emails she and Sarah had exchanged made no mention of a boyfriend. She pointed that out casually, and watched as a flush spread across Sarah's cheeks.

"I don't talk about him much. He's... older than I am. By like a lot. It makes some people uncomfortable."

Joan only smiled. "So, let's talk about the apartment. You're a children's librarian?"

"And a few other things, but that's the full-time job."

* * *

A few hours later, when Sherlock had returned from his two hours with Alfredo, Joan looked up from her phone. He shrugged out of his jacket and scarves, tossing them onto a chair with impatient, jerky movements.

"In what culture is it common to carve up blackbird feathers, in order to prevent bad luck?"

Sherlock looked at her for a moment. She watched his gaze turn inward as he searched through what he knew. But then he shook his head. "None in the Western hemisphere. I assume Google told you the same?"

"Yes," she said. "I'm pretty sure my sub-letter has... problems."

"If she doesn't damage your property and doesn't film more — "

"I know," Joan sighed. "Her problems don't have to be my problems."

* * *

If her leg had let her, Sarah would have skipped all the way back to the subway. But it was throbbing badly, and had ever since she'd picked up that damned feather.

Their use of magic — if that was what they were doing with the falling feathers — was getting more sophisticated. She'd taken the knife to the foot over two months ago. It had been almost healed. With enough ibuprofen, it hadn't even hurt.

She rode the trains back to her stop, trudged the three blocks to her crappy current apartment, and heaved herself up the steps.

None of her roommates were in. Sarah surveyed the cramped space and was grateful for the silence.

Blackbirds perched on the tiny, railed outcropping their landlord called a balcony and charged them extra for. They all stared at her with beady, tired eyes.

Sarah ignored them and headed to the room she shared with Maggie. She closed and bolted the door, then pressed the palm of her hand against the mirror.

After a moment, the Goblin King appeared in the mirror. He was only a few inches taller than she was, and had managed to place his hand in the same spot on his mirror that she had on hers. She almost smiled; they were only a world or so apart.

"I got the apartment I showed you," she said. "And they've definitely started following me if I don't wear your glamour."

The only sign that he was pleased was the way his mouth curled up for a fleeting instant. "Any evidence that they see through the glamour?"

Sarah shook her head. "They haven't given any sign of it. They'll follow me to wherever I am when I start wearing the charm, and then lose me."

The Goblin King nodded. His expression was thoughtful for a moment.

"Your majesty," Sarah said, softly. His gaze flicked back to her. He seemed more present, more immediate, than he had been a moment ago. "Is there any chance of my seeing Toby?"

His mouth curled again, even as he considered. After a silence that seemed to stretch, he said, "Meet us in that park of yours in an hour."

"_Where_ in the park," she began, exasperated. Central Park was not actually a small place.

But the Goblin King was gone from her mirror. Sarah sighed.

* * *

Yet another wooded section of the park had been cordoned off by the time she arrived. Cops buzzed around it like angry bees, swarming and ebbing, and Sarah gave it a wide birth. She noted a woman who reminded her of Joan — but it couldn't be Joan Watson; that'd be way too many coincidences — as she headed away from it.

She didn't find the Goblin King or Toby.

They found her.

She couldn't help the smile, not that she'd have tried. For Toby's stake, she tried to stay cheerful when she saw them. He rushed for her legs, and she wrapped her arms around him, swinging him up and around.

"Toby," she said. "It's good to see you. Who's been doing your lessons?"

Toby grinned easily at her. "Jareth has."

Sarah looked over at the Goblin King, who looked back at her and arched his brow. His expression spoke of either injured dignity or impugned innocence; there was really no telling with him.

"And what's he been teaching you, huh?"

"History," Toby said, brightly, before squirming until Sarah had to put him down. She ruffled his hair through his hat. "And what to do with salt, and where to put an iron knife in somebody's leg so they can't chase me."

"Oh _really_?" She asked, and hoped the Goblin King heard the fury strung underneath her voice.

"He says knees are very important. And tomorrow I get to learn 'bout hamstringing!"

"Hamstringing," Sarah said, stomping on fallen leaves.

"Yeah. Jareth says that's when you get in the back of the knee and cut the tendons in the calf. It's real complicated to do if you're not up close. But if you hamstring a fairy creature with an iron knife, it'll be like Wayland Smith and never walk again."

"Toby, I want you to wait here and close your ears," Sarah said, before grabbing the Goblin King's elbow and dragging him a few paces away.

She kept her eye on Toby the whole time. The Goblin King didn't seem the least bothered about being touched; then again, he'd been invading her personal space since she'd turned fifteen. Maybe he was pleased she was finally returning the favor.

"I didn't send him to the Underground to learn to _stab_ people!" Sarah hissed. "I sent him to you to keep him safe!"

The Goblin King raised an eyebrow at her. "And you think knowing how to defend himself, should he need it, makes him less so?"

"I didn't want him exposed to — to this! All the violence and — "

"I understand your sentiment, Sarah," he said, stressing her name in a way that never failed, even these long years later, to make her knees a little weak, "but better he should know what to do when confronted with violence than he be helpless. I assure you, his innocence is unharmed by simple preparation."

"I hope so," she said. She allowed her gaze to drift past Toby, toward the thick knot of police and the new bodies.

They weren't fresh, she knew. Whoever was dumping bodies in Central Park was... keeping them. For a while, at least.

* * *

So I've been thinking about how to blend these canons for a while now, and I think I've found a way. Maybe. We'll see how it goes. (Work on the next chapter of Broken Statues? Ha! It's my birthday; I write what I want.)


End file.
